One character a day, easy to master Chinese characters. Let’s take a look at the basic knowledge of “穴”.
穴 xué | |
Explnantion: cave | |
Phrases: 洞穴dònɡ xué:cave ;穴位xué wèi:acupuncture point ; |
“穴” (xue, cave) is a pictograph, written as in small seal script, which is like a grotto. The upper part of the character is “宀” that represents covering, while the lower part represents a hole or cave. Therefore, the original meaning of this character is a hole in ground or a burrow. “穴” in regular script keeps the basic form of small seal script. It is also a radical of Chinese characters. All the characters relevant to house or hole take it as the radical, such as “窖” (jiao, vault), “窗” (chuang, window) , “窝” (wo, nest), etc.
People in the remote antiquity usually dig a hole as their shelter. “穴” was the residence before people learned how to build a house. When people built houses, “穴” usually means the lair of animals or the place where the dead is buried. “穴位” (xuewei, acupuncture point) is the part for acupuncture. The scientific name for acupuncture point is “acupoint”, or xue, xuewei and xuedao. In theories of Chinese medicine, this is the part where the energy of viscera and channels goes to the body surface.
Sentences
他们在洞穴里发现了石洞壁画。
针灸学把分布于十二经脉的循行路线上的穴位称为经穴。